Thursday, December 18, 2014

The Court finds the respondent liable for simple neglect of duty for failure to serve court notices promptly. Simple neglect of duty is failure to give proper attention to a required task. It signifies disregard of duty due to carelessness or indifference. 8

Section 52(B)(l) of the Revised Uniform Rules on Administrative Cases in the Civil Service (CSC Memorandum Circular No. 19, s. 1999) classifies simple neglect of duty as a less grave offense punishable by one ( 1) month and one ( 1) day to six ( 6) months suspension for the first offense.

At the same time, Section 53 of the same Rules provides that in the determination of the penalties to be imposed, mitigating, aggravating and alternative circumstances attendant to the commission of the offense shall be considered. The respondent's heavy workload and the fact that he attended to the service of summons and that the defendant was clearly evading service of summons should work to mitigate the respondent's culpability.

WHEREFORE, the Court finds respondent Elmer S. Azcueta, Process Server, Regional Trial Court, Branch 22, Imus, Cavite GUILTY of simple neglect of duty. He is hereby REPRIMANDED and WARNED that a repetition of the same or similar act shall be dealt with more severely.